Lucky
by insaneprincess
Summary: -"She can’t stop the world from falling apart. The only thing she can do is stop herself from being part of it before it hits the ground."-An exploration of what it means to be second best. Warning: Contains suicide and dark themes.


Disclaimer: I don't own SWAC, obviously.

A/n. So. This is rated T, because I don't think it's graphic or heavy enough to be rated M, but it is dark. Enjoy, and reviews are love. Also, this is in Tawni's point of view.

WARNING: Because I'm unsure on the rating, I'm warning you. SUICIDE and DARK THEMES are in this story, and if you're against that, than you may not want to read. Let me know if you think this should be an 'M' rating, and I'll definitely move it to that.

**Lucky**

She lights the cigarette with a shaking hand that she quickly hides. She has no weaknesses, she swears. Not that they'd ever believe that she did, because she is perfect, of course.

She takes a sweet drag of the tobacco, only hating herself a little for it. A disgusting habit, and she knows she shouldn't, but she also knows that she's a masochist. And cigarettes aren't that bad, in comparison to the other ways she hurts herself.

Did she mention that she's perfect?

She straightens the neat blue dress she's wearing tonight (it's not as pretty as the brunette's, but then, it never could be), and drops the cigarette. She can't be seen out here, it's not right, it's not her. She has an image, a lovely perfect image, because that's what she is. She's addicted to perfection more than the cigarettes, and that's just the way she wants it.

She pulls out her pocket mirror, bedazzled and glittery. She smoothes her hair, and attempts to fix her crooked smile that doesn't look natural or right (because it's not) and turns back to the roar of the crowd behind her, because that's where she's supposed to be. Because she is rich and famous and beautiful and successful, and most of all, happy as hell, and lucky, so goddamn _lucky_.

--

That perfect girl, the funny one who's stealing her dressing room and spot on the show and _life_, runs into their dressing room, squealing. She is happyhappyhappy, because she is _lucky_ (and they've all said that from the beginning, and they mean it, don't they) and she has a _date_ tonight, and she's never been this happy in her life.

She tries on fifty-seven outfits and doesn't even need make-up, because she's already glowing (they say love does that to a girl) and when he picks her up, there he is, blue-eyed and successful (and looking the same as he always does, why does that hurt?), and that glowing brunette leaves with him, blushing and laughing and _winning_, because she always is.

And she will sit here, in the dressing room still, alone. Because she doesn't need anyone, certainly not the bubbly brunette who's supposed to be her friend, or the charming blue-eyed boy she once believed in, and gave up on a long time ago, because she didn't think he understood what it was like to feel something.

But he does now, doesn't he? And the two of them glitter together, stars, their own perfect constellation of pure happiness.

--

Some days, she feels like she's made out of glass.

For one thing, she sparkles. (Ask anyone, they'll tell you). She shines and glitters and catches the light, but of course, not like crystal or diamond. (That blue-eyed boy calls her, the winsome brunette who's stolen her place and her life, Diamond. It's his nickname, and sometimes she thinks that the bitch that is life has a really twisted sense of humour.) Because they're perfect.

Of course, she's not as strong as diamond, either. She's fragile, so very breakable. But looking at glass, at its structure and shine, you'd hardly believe it could shatter. And there's the metaphor – she pretends she's not in a thousand pieces, either.

--

She's old news.

Everyone has their time, they say. They tell her she's lucky she lasted so long in the spotlight, and to be happy with the big paycheck and fancy clothes and nice dressing room and limousine, that she's _lucky_ and she should be _happy_.

They don't comment on the way that she's _not_ happy, because mostly, they can't see it, and if they do, they sure as hell don't want to. After all, what do you say to a girl who has everything in the world and wants nothing but to be gone from it?

--

"I made the cover of Seventeen!" she squeals, happy and lucky and deserving. She glows as she waves the magazine around, like a knife. There she is, on the cover, smiling and content and unbreakable. There she is, perfect.

_Perfect._

And she dances around the room, followed by the burning blue eyes of the broken girl who pastes on her fake smile, and congratulates her, and playfully says that she'll never be as pretty as her, even though it's such a lie. And she keeps on that fake smile, making up another lie, and says she's going shopping, and congratulations, and goodbye.

And she stands in a corner of the parking lot, fingers trembling and stumbling with her familiar lighter, so desperate for a smoke that she feels like she can't breathe. And by the time she's inhaling the familiar taste of sweet tobacco, she pretends that she feels okay and that the cigarette is helping even though it's not and never will and the world is spinning, and she doesn't remember when it began to feel like it was too much effort to breathe.

--

They offer her a movie role. It makes her feel thirsty for it, for fame and success and feelings she doesn't remember.

But she looks at the papers, for the idiotic and boring script, for the character description of the dumb whore she's supposed to play and she feels sick. Does she want to do this, really? This isn't her type of character, and she used to be little girls' role model, and even if she isn't anymore, she can't be anything good after this movie.

But she needs it now, she needs anything that might put her name in headlines, her face on magazine covers.

The ironic part is, the happier you are, the more covers they want to put your smiling face on, and the sadder and more broken you are, the less covers they want to put your empty smile on, and it's such a vicious cycle that she should understand how to survive it, but she doesn't.

Damn, she needs a cigarette.

She looks at the greasy director in front of her and the scummy papers and bites her lip. It's no choice, really.

She picks up her bedazzled pen, the only thing that shines in this place (she belongs here, doesn't she) and signs the papers.

--

She doesn't know whether he's attractive or not. She has no idea, because he's just blurry to her, and she's probably had a little too much vodka, but it makes her laugh, which is funny, because she can't remember the last time she laughed when she was sober.

She also can't tell the difference between a leer and a smile, so she lets him take her hand and dance way too close, because she's not afraid. Why should she be? Someone finally wants her, and it feels so damn good.

His hands are hot on her waist. Her dress is black and short and attention-grabbing in the way that she doesn't remember how to be. His eyes are unnaturally dark and he is whispering in her ear, and she cannot understand the words, and the whole world is hazy, but that's okay. He's taking her hand, and they're leaving the club, and she doesn't know where she is, just that someone wants to hold her hand and take her away, and she's so okay with that.

He's got his own driver, and he's pressing hot kisses on her neck and she lets him, even though she doesn't know his name, even though she feels like she maybe shouldn't let him, but it feels kind of good, and she doesn't mind it, and everything is blurry and spinning. And somehow, they're at some building – an apartment? – and this feels familiar (maybe because she's been doing this for weeks on end now, even though it only makes her feel worse in the morning) but she just goes with it, and lets him kiss her and hold her and lead her into his empty apartment because it's so very easy to trust someone who makes you feel wanted.

--

They ask her a lot of things. The usual – favourite store, favourite sketch she's been in, what inspires her writing, focusing techniques in acting, how the director is, favourite Hollywood restaurant. The fake smile settles unnaturally on her skin.

They ask her about her upcoming movie role – something unexpected, they say. It doesn't fit with the rest of her acting roles, they say, (meaning the movie is trashy and the character is a whore) faking a smile almost as well as she does.

"Well," she tells them. "I wanted to try something unexpected and really expand my career, you know? I think there's really some depth in this character, and I wanted to explore something I'd never really tried before."

They smile and nod, and don't question that, because it's not their job to. Instead, they ask her about her co-star's perfect romance with the boy one stage over.

"Oh, they're perfect together," she promises. "They're just so in love, and it's really cute. It makes everyone happy to see them happy together."

The words taste like Splenda on her teeth – fake and chemical, too sweet to be honest, because honesty is bitter and hard to swallow, not like sugar-spun snowflakes strong enough to build a snowy palace of lies.

--

Her head is throbbing when she wakes up, and the world is spinning and she holds back the vomit climbing up her throat. It's a familiar feeling and taste, and she's very good at remaining calm, waking up somewhere else. She looks beside her to the man sprawled on the mattress next to her. She has no idea who he is, but then, she never does.

She slips out from under the covers, and finds his bathroom. She's a mess, or at least her reflection is, because she's perfect after all, so she can't be a mess. Her make-up is smudged inches below her lashes, and her hair is wild and the look in her eyes is far too vulnerable. She cleans up her hair and makeup and puts up the wall she always has, and peers through his medicine cabinet for some well-needed Tylenol. Instead, she finds red lipstick and a box of tampons. She knows she's a bad person from the way she doesn't feel all that bad that he has a girlfriend.

"Hey."

She turns quickly, not ashamed at getting caught, but startled by his unexpected presence all the same. He's kind of cute, and that makes her feel a little guilty, but she swallows it down like the Tylenol she can't find.

He's looking at her, his expression slowly shifting. "You're Tawni Hart," he says, quietly, shocked. And it shocks her that he's shocked, but of course, she looked like just another wreckage, drunk and hopeless, not like a successful and happy and _lucky_ star. He's blown away that someone like her is really the way she is, and she's terrified because she should be gone by now and not having this conversation, because he's not supposed to recognize or remember her, and least of all begin to understand her because _no one _does, certainly not some stranger she shouldn't be with anyways.

"I have to go," she says quietly, and flees in last night's dress and heels with the stranger who isn't really a stranger's (not because he's been inside her, but because he sees inside her) eyes on her back.

--

She'd consider herself a damsel in distress.

But there's only one Prince Charming, isn't there? And he's smitten with some girl who never needed saving in the first place, and so there are thousands of damsels in thousands of towers, still waiting, hopelessly. And she's only one of them, and what's she supposed to do, save herself?

She's tried. It doesn't happen.

And when there's a fire-breathing dragon beyond her door, or her tower is crumbling, what is she supposed to do? She can't stop the world from falling apart. The only thing she can do is stop herself from being part of it before it hits the ground.

--

She thinks that running into him is hardly a coincidence.

She's sitting by herself, accustomed to that by now, a cigarette on her lips, without even trying to hide it. It's a full-blown addiction now, and she needs it.

He brings her a glass of white wine, which is fine, because she likes the way it seems sweet and bitter all at once, so she takes it and sips the alcohol lightly.

"If you're attempting to get me drunk so I'll sleep with you again, this was a good start," she humourlessly informs the stranger who's not a stranger.

He smirks nonetheless, the corner of his mouth twitching into a crooked smile. "I'm not, but I'm glad you think the worst of me."

She thinks back to the red lipstick and tampons in his medicine cabinet. "Why wouldn't I?"

He looks at her a long moment, not considering her question, caught in the smoke swirling off her cigarette and her starving blue eyes. He's attractive, not that she cares, and his eyes are a beautiful hazel, which is a nice change from the blue eyes of the boy dancing with the brunette across the room, that she's so used to getting lost in and hurt by.

"I want to help you," the not-a-stranger whispers.

Abruptly, she drops the cigarette, and stubs it out with her stiletto. "You can't help me," she says, not denying that she needs it. She swallows down the last drink of wine, and stands, dropping the wineglass on purpose, just to see it shatter. Nothing is unbreakable, after all. "No one can," she tells him, walking away and not looking back as her stilettos crunch in the broken glass.

--

Once upon a time, (because this is a fairytale, go on and tell it to your children) she was happy and lucky and perfect. Of course, she's always been all of these things, and she still is, but back then, she was even more so, and she shone like a real star, and she wore bright colours and her eyes sparkled and everyone in the world could see her happiness because it shimmered off of her like her own vitality.

It was him, they said. She'd always been happy, but he was like luck. Make your own luck, everyone always said, and she certainly had. They were a match made in heaven, two blonde, blue-eyed angels. He was always holding her hand, and kissing her hair, and tracing her jaw with the tips of her fingertips, and he told her that he loved her. And she believed him.

He was handsome, and famous, and even more sensitive and caring than his title character on Mackenzie Falls, and she was crazy for him. At the time, she didn't mean that literally, crazy, but later, _after_, she did.

When he broke her heart, the sun was shining, and the world was just as beautiful as it always was. And all she's learned from him is that the world keeps turning, and stays beautiful whether you're so happy and you feel like nothing gets better than this, or whether you've never felt so broken and you can't breathe, and you collapse in the parking lot, and don't let yourself cry.

(And she'd tell you that it ends in happily ever after, but it isn't over yet).

--

Her mother smiles at her. "I'm so proud of you," she says, fastening glittering sapphire earrings.

Proud. She's _proud._

"It's just," her mother continues, while perfectly applying her lipstick, "that now, I feel like I'm really seeing you mature. Independently making decisions about your career, and deciding your future. This movie role will be a success."

She nods, because her mother is always right. Success. The movie role is a success.

It's funny how, since birth, you can believe your parents with anything they tell you, no matter how unbelievable. And then you grow up and they tell you reasonable things, things they honestly believe, and you try to tell yourself it's true, but you just can't believe it.

Santa Claus sounds much more plausible than success, right now.

But she smiles, because hell, she's an actress, and it's so easy to make parents proud, all you have to do is live your life, not that she's very good at that, either.

And her mother smiles back, spraying perfume heavily on her perfect collarbones. Because her mother is exactly what she herself will be in twenty-five years. Someone who used to be beautiful, someone who's holding onto everything she's lost, someone who tries so hard to be proud when there's nothing to be proud of, because she loves so much. And she needs someone to love her back so desperately, because her daughter sure as hell isn't going to, so she's leaving now, on another date, with another perfect man who can't actually make her happy. But he can try.

So her daughter smiles. Because that's what you're supposed to do to cheer people up and make them happy. Smile like you're okay. Wave it in their face. And she cheerfully wishes her mother good luck and says goodbye, and sits alone on the sofa, not disappointed, because the house feels just as empty as when her mother was there.

--

They're in the dressing room, together (a rare occurrence, these days), writing sketches, when she finally brings it up.

"Tawni," the brunette says quietly, her pen pausing hesitantly on the paper. "Are you… okay?"

The blonde looks up from where she's been gazing at the blank page in front of her, empty of ideas and words in general. "What?" she says, surprised, as her heartbeat picks up. "Of course I am. What are you talking about?"

The brunette bites her lip, glancing down at the paper, and scribbling out a line. "Nothing, I guess," she says reluctantly. "You've just been quiet lately, is all."

And the blonde could smile right now, because it means her co-star doesn't really know – not about the cigarettes or the vodka or the strangers she goes home with or the jealousy or the hollow feeling inside of her right now. And if she doesn't know, than the lies are even simpler.

"I'm fine," she says. "Everything's completely fine."

The brunette's mouth twists, as if she doesn't understand that. Her brow furrows, and she looks like she's about to protest, but there is a knock at the door, and it's a delivery for the happy girl in the room. It's a bushel of blood-red roses, overflowing in her arms, and she's glowing just holding them, and just like that, their conversation is over. Because that's the thing about love. It makes you do the stupidest things, like forget about a conversation that might change someone's life.

--

She's outside again, and a party pulses behind her. She doesn't remember whose it is, but that doesn't matter. She feels the strobe lights and bass notes like a heartbeat, as familiar to her as the sound of her own breathing, although that's weak these days.

When she sees the figure approaching her, she's sure it's the hazel-eyed boy. He's always there, these days, offering her a drink (which she takes) and advice (which she doesn't take). She doesn't let herself find his company comforting, because he may be a boy she's slept with, but he's really just a stranger, and he's not important. Besides, she thinks, her mind stuck for a moment on the red lipstick in his medicine cabinet (why does she keep coming back to that?), she doesn't even know his name.

However, she realizes in a flash of coloured lights, that it's not him. It's the blue-eyed boy from Stage 2 that she's attempted to forget, and he's the last person she wants to talk to, ever.

She fumbles with her lighter, the flame flickering out. She needs a new cigarette – hell, she deserves one – and she can't light the damn thing because her hand is shaking. Fuck.

"Hey," he says, attempting a smile that fits his face like a scar. It's not a real smile (trust her, she's seen one on his face, just not directed at her). It's a ghost of one, crooked and wrong, and it doesn't fit his face the way she doesn't fit with him, and she wants him to stop trying.

"Chad," she says, possibly because she knows it'll take a lifetime of effort just to say his name. It tastes like dust on her tongue. Has it been so long since she's spoken to him?

He bites his lip (not like him at all, because he's perfect too) and takes her lighter from her, and lights her cigarette with a perfectly steady hand. She hates him for it, automatically, because even though she's perfect (she has to be), she can't do that, she can never fucking compare. Because every time she convinces herself that she's devastatingly perfect, he comes along and reminds her that no, she's not.

Because she can't be. She can make her hair as blonde as the bottle of dye will let her, but it'll still never be chestnut brown. And her hand can shake like hell, it'll still light that cigarette. And she can practise that smile all she wants, it'll still never make her look happy.

She can try as hard as she damn well wants, but she'll never be Sonny Munroe, and this boy will never want her, so she can't be perfect.

"Why aren't you at the party?" he asks, his voice raw. For a moment, she thinks he cares, but then she remembers that he's an actor and he's always been good at convincing her that he has a heart.

She shrugs though, because she can't explain to him. _Well, see, I needed a cigarette because I'm full-blown addicted now, to them and your blue eyes, and I can't watch you dance with her when we used to dance like that, once upon a time._

"Tawni," he says quietly, "I think you should stop smoking."

So that's what this is. Of course he didn't come to talk to her because he wanted to talk to her, but because he wants to _help_ her, just like everybody else, who thinks it's that damn easy, that you can glue the pieces together and you'll never see the cracks. She knows better than to listen to him, because he can't fix anything, and all he ever does is tear apart her life. He convinces her that she's never been perfect and that he wants to help her – two lies she's sick of believing – and she can't take this anymore.

But she's never known how to walk away from him. That was always her problem. So, she stays, humour her final refuge.

"Chad," she says, trying to find a way to put the mirth in her tone, "I think you should start smoking."

His eyes are sad, but she avoids them to look at the stars. It's a beautiful night, but she never remembers that. When did she stop looking at the stars? When did she forget that the world could be beautiful?

"Tawni," he whispers, his voice breaking on her name, and her eyes flicker to him without a thought. His hand comes up to trace her jaw, and she loses her breath, caught in the way he gives her moments like this. She always gets caught in the way he makes her believe he cares, that he might even love her, even though she doesn't think she believes in love.

But his eyes are sad, not loving, as if she's a car crash about to happen, a time bomb about to explode, as if she's inches from disaster, and he can't know things like that, because even she doesn't know things like that, and she refuses to believe that's the point.

Still, she can't take that look, because it's not the right one. It doesn't convince her that he cares (because he's not trying to, anymore); just that he's mourning her, as if she's already gone.

She doesn't know how to get up from the curb and throw the still-lit cigarette at him, and walk away, stilettos clicking and hips swinging, because he knows her better than that. He knows that she's a scared little girl underneath the façade of an independent, _perfect_ young woman who has everything figured out. And she can't lie to him.

That's why he's the one who gets up and walks away from her. Because he's good at that, at leaving her. He'll go back to the party and dance with the girl he's happy with, and congratulate himself for picking the sane girl, and leaving hopeless one behind him on the curb. She wishes she could follow him, drink vodka from the bottle, go home with a stranger. But tonight is different, and she can't. Tonight is a heavier pain, tonight is the foreshadowing she won't let herself interpret, because that means she has to try to save herself, to pick up the broken glass, and she knows too well that all that does is make you bleed.

She doesn't like the way she feels after he leaves, as if it was somehow his final goodbye. And she's so _angry_. She swears she's never been this mad in her life.

She's supposed to get a limo, or a taxi, or something to get home, but she can't think straight, and even though she feels dizzy, she also feels completely sober, like the world is all straight lines, and she can see life like it's some kind of horizon that she's crossing.

She walks home, the stars above her. But they are no longer beautiful to her, they glint cruelly, sharp, like blue eyes that keep on lying, and can't save her, because no one can save her, and besides, she doesn't need saving. She's fine. No, she's better than fine. She's perfect.

Of course she is. She can't let him make her forget it, because that's like forgetting her entire identity, like forgetting her own name, like forgetting why the hell she's living her life anymore, if she isn't perfect. But she is. She's always been perfect, and he can't steal that from her in one look. Because she is part of infinity, part of the stars, (she's always been a star) and she will always, _always_ sparkle.

By the time she gets home, she realizes she doesn't have a key. _She doesn't have a fucking key._

She stares at the house. Normally, at this point, she'd be in tears. She cries too easily these days, and she expects the familiar lump in her throat, burning in her eyes. She'd have to wipe away the glitter make-up that lets her always sparkle, and the fake eyelashes (she's always been fake too, but she never, _never_ admits that) and get used to the tears that have become more of a best friend than herself recently.

But tonight she doesn't cry. She feels heavy and disjointed and like she's in a thousand pieces, and tears don't even cross her mind, because they're a waste. A waste of her perfection.

She moves to the side of the house. She knows her mother will either be out on a date, wearing a shorter dress than her own daughter; or drunk asleep. It doesn't matter. She's not here, not in the important ways.

She's at the bathroom window, with a sharp plan in her head. Dimly, she realizes she still has the cigarette, and drops it in the grass, stubbing it out with her heel. She pauses a moment, and then takes off that shoe. She faces the window, and crashes the sharp heel through the glass window.

The glass shatters around her, like rain, and she's frozen for a moment at how utterly beautiful brokenness can be. Then she lifts her gaze back to the window, now a pathway into her house. Her arm is still outstretched, shoe in hand, with a deep cut on her wrist from a shard of flying glass, blood dripping heavily across her skin. She pauses for a moment, surprised. It is deep crimson, and it too is surprisingly beautiful.

Slowly, she pulls herself through the window, not even noticing the way the remaining fragments of glass clinging to windowsill slash her skin. She collapses onto the floor, staring at the broken glass scattered across the tiles. It sparkles. It reminds her of the stars, sparkling and cold. It reminds her of herself, something pretty thrown into a thousand pieces. It reminds her of his eyes, glittering and sharp, made up of countless promises and lies.

She carefully picks up a shard of glass. It reminds her of a thousand things. But it is something uniquely its own to her. As she raises it up, and slowly brings it to her wrist for the first time, she sees it as an escape.

And she brings down the shard, over and over, countless times. Until she is surrounded by blood and memories and broken glass, and she is certain this time will be the final time, this breath will be her last, because she's perfect and he can't touch that, and he can't save her, and _she's fucking perfect_, so this is how it ends, like a fairytale. _Happily ever after. _


End file.
